Even the deregulation-happy Wall St. Journal sounded shocked: “The Department of Energy is proposing to allow the sale of tons of scrap metal from government nuclear sites — an attempt to reduce waste that critics say could lead to radiation-tainted belt buckles, surgical implants and other consumer products.”

Having failed in the ‘80s and ‘90s to free the nuclear bomb factories and national laboratories of millions of tons of their radioactively contaminated scrap and nickel, the DOE is trying again. Its latest proposal is moving ahead without even an Environmental Impact Statement. Those messy EISs involve public hearings, so you can imagine the DOE’s reluctance to face the public over adding yet more radiation to the doses we’re already accumulating.

A Department of Energy proposal to allow up to 14,000 metric tons of its radioactive scrap metal to be recycled into consumer products was called into question today by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) due to concerns over public health. In a letter sent to DOE head Steven Chu, Rep. Markey expressed “grave concerns” over the potential of these metals becoming jewelry, cutlery, or other consumer products that could exceed healthy doses of radiation without any knowledge by the consumer. DOE made the proposal to rescind its earlier moratorium on radioactive scrap metal recycling in December, 2012.

The proposal follows an incident from 2012 involving Bed, Bath & Beyond stores in America recalling tissue holders made in India that were contaminated with the radio-isotope cobalt-60. Those products were shipped to 200 stores in 20 states. In response to that incident, a Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesperson advised members of the public to return the products even though the amount of contamination was not considered to be a health risk.

The Department of Energy has a problem: what to do with millions of tons of radioactive material. So the DOE has come up with an ingenious plan to dispose of its troublesome tons of nickel, copper, steel and aluminum. It wants to let scrap companies collect the metal, try to take the radioactivity out, and sell the metal to foundries, which would in turn sell it to manufacturers who could use it for everyday household products: pots, pans, forks, spoons, even your eyeglasses.

You may not know this, but the government already permits some companies under special licenses, to buy, reprocess and sell radioactive metal: 7,500 tons in 1996, by one industry estimate. But the amount of this reprocessing could increase drastically if the DOE, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), and the burgeoning radioactive metal processing industry get their way.

They are pressing for a new, lax standard that would do away with special permits and allow companies to buy and resell millions of tons of low-level radioactive metal.

***

The standard the companies seek could cause nearly 100,000 cancer fatalities in the United States, by the NRC’s own estimate.

(A couple of years later, Congressman Markey successfully banned most radioactive scrap … but now DOE is trying to bring it back.)

Radioactive scrap is a global problem. As Bloomberg reported last year:

“The major risk we face in our industry is radiation,” said Paul de Bruin, radiation-safety chief for Jewometaal Stainless Processing, one of the world’s biggest stainless-steel scrap yards. “You can talk about security all you want, but I’ve found weapons-grade uranium in scrap. Where was the security?”

More than 120 shipments of contaminated goods, including cutlery, buckles and work tools such as hammers and screwdrivers, were denied U.S. entry between 2003 and 2008 after customs and the Department of Homeland Security boosted radiation monitoring at borders.

The department declined to provide updated figures or comment on how the metal tissue boxes at Bed, Bath & Beyond, tainted with cobalt-60 used in medical instruments to diagnose and treat cancer, evaded detection.

***

“The general public basically isn’t aware that they’re living in a radioactive world,” according to Ross Bartley, technical director for the recycling bureau, who said the contamination has led to lost sales. “Those tissue boxes are problematic because they’re radioactive and they had to be put in radioactive disposal.”

Abandoned medical scanners, food-processing devices and mining equipment containing radioactive metals such as cesium-137 and cobalt-60 are picked up by scrap collectors, sold to recyclers and melted down by foundries, the IAEA says.

Dangerous scrap comes from derelict hospitals and military bases, as well as defunct government agencies that have lost tools with radioactive elements.

Chronic exposure to low doses of radiation can lead to cataracts, cancer and birth defects, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. A 2005 study of more than 6,000 Taiwanese who lived in apartments built with radioactive reinforcing steel from 1983 to 2005 showed a statistically significant increase in leukemia and breast cancer.

***

India and China were the top sources of radioactive goods shipped to the U.S. through 2008, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Bartley, a metallurgist who has tracked radioactive contamination since the early 1990s, said there’s no evidence the situation has improved.

***

Two years after an Indian scrap-metal worker died from radiation exposure, the world’s second-most populous country hasn’t installed alarms, the Ministry of Shipping said in December.

***

“The same thing could easily happen again tomorrow,” said Deepak Jain, 65, who owns the yard where the worker died. “We have no protection. The government promised a lot, but has delivered absolutely nothing.”

Indeed, we are being bombarded with low-level radiation from all sides:

* This photo is used only for illustrative purposes and does not mean to imply that this highly imaginative silver cutlery set is poisonous. We borrowed the photo under what might be called ‘creative license’ under the protection of ‘fair use’, to effectively draw your attention to this important news. For more information about the work of this artist, please visit www.andrelassen.com.

I’ve always wonder what the death rate is a plants that make bombs with raidoasctive casing. I think we just need to start more wars and in away we have by shipping the stuff to other countries so it can be used there or shipped back to Amerika as a product. Amazing, govt. at work.

suzy

I can tell you that the cancer rate around the nuclear diffusion plant (a superfund site) is very high.

B T

Shop with one of those portable Geiger counters…lol. I’m getting one soon. Less than the price of that new I toy you bought for Xmas and a lot more valuable.

http://twitter.com/boodiba Linda Maddocks

What model? Maybe I need one!

http://twitter.com/v6guitar Michael S Waggoner

BT get me oOnNeE pretty please

LesBarany

A disposable wooden set or Andre Lassen’s sterling silver spoon, fork and knife? Silver prices have been fluctuating so I can’t give you an exact price, but the it should be somewhere between three and four thousand dollars. In bronze, around half of that. Hardly an item for everyday use, unless you are Tim Burton, but you never know. Give A
ndre or me a call. We are not hard to find.

redfish7@verizon.net

Think of the money you’ll save by not having to buy batteries for your “glow in the dark flashlight”, turn the lights off early at dinner time and use your “glow in the dark silverware”. I love my government, they just want to help me.

LesBarany

This is the note I left under this article. Please read if you care about artist’s copyrights and visit the site, perhaps to add a comment of your own: It is because of sites like Washington’s Blog that I support the most draconian anti-piracy laws and then some. To spruce up and draw attention to this otherwise yawn inducing article the author grabbed an image off the Internet that he or she feels visually illustrates their point, but in the process cause damage to the reputation of an innocent Amsterdam artist, Andre Lassen, by implying that his silver cutlery set may be poisonous, instead of using a copyright-free generic image. While I understand their thinking, I deplore such callous disregard for artists’ copyrights. In the minimum, under the photo of the cutlery there should be the following caption: This photo is used only for illustrative purposes and does not mean to imply that this highly imaginative silver cutlery set is poisonous. We borrowed the photo under what might be called ‘creative license’ under the protection of ‘fair use’, to effectively draw your attention to this important news. For more information about the work of this artist, please visit http://www.andrelassen.com. – The Editors

http://www.facebook.com/alan.beck.79 Alan Beck

Cool…so when i take a crap…the toilet bowl will also be “Illuminated”…lol

ephanee

hahahaha …..lol…..ROTF……..lmao…….

LesBarany

And you had deleted it!

This is the note I left under this article. Please read if you care about artist’s copyrights and visit the site, perhaps to add a comment of your own: It is because of sites like Washington’s Blog that I support the most draconian anti-piracy laws and then some. To spruce up and draw attention to this otherwise yawn inducing article the author grabbed an image off the Internet that he or she feels visually illustrates their point, but in the process cause damage to the reputation of an innocent Amsterdam artist, Andre Lassen, by implying that his silver cutlery set may be poisonous, instead of using a copyright-free generic image. While I understand their thinking, I deplore such callous disregard for artists’ copyrights. In the minimum, under the photo of the cutlery there should be the following caption: This photo is used only for illustrative purposes and does not mean to imply that this highly imaginative silver cutlery set is poisonous. We borrowed the photo under what might be called ‘creative license’ under the protection of ‘fair use’, to effectively draw your attention to this important news. For more information about the work of this artist, please visit http://www.andrelassen.com. – The Editors

LesBarany

Yes, I had already made that comment and you have deleted it!

LesBarany

By no means am I advising violating the copyrights of artists, but some of these helpful links for further reading on the topic would do well to borrow one of H.R. Giger’s Atomic Children artworks to bring attention to their important warnings. Unfortunately, it is hard to grab most people’s attention, even to such topics of grave concern, without stops-you-dead-in-your-tracks visuals.

LesBarany

Why not, instead, follow my advice?

Ray

What kind of EVIL trash is running our country? What planet did these miscreants come from? More importantly, what have we got to do to remove them from positions of power and ideally …. imprison them so they can’t do any more harm to the human race?

Smannzie

they dont give a rats ass about us they only care about their lovely retirement pension awaiting them its obvious if they did care then they would use they brain and actually think but that is to much work for them they would rather just relax and do nothing

PatGinSD

As Michael Jackson sang right before his sudden death:
They Don’t Care About Us

PatGinSD

As Michael Jackson sang right before his sudden death:
They Don’t Care About Us

Smannzie

they dont give a rats ass about us they only care about their lovely retirement pension awaiting them its obvious if they did care then they would use they brain and actually think but that is to much work for them they would rather just relax and do nothing

These people should be jailed for dereliction of duty, public endangerment, and a host of other charges. Are they nuts?

William Burke

No, they’re NOT nuts. They just want to kill most of us off, is all. More stuff for them, that way.

Spire

Murder with a profit motive. Beyond treason, it is institutionalized serial murder. Can’t believe these guys are not in jail or committed to a loony bin. Instead, they want to make this an official policy.

Are we beginning to get the idea, yet? Kill us off while they profit from the sales, plus look at all the medical bills this will put in the pockets of Big Pharma and the Medical butchers as well. Can’t believe I am living to see this. So friggin’ obvious their intent, so friggin’ mysterious to the ignorant, co-dependent citizens who will never believe the govt. is out to get them. Now I lay me down to sleep …

jessicacoco2005

It costs money to properly dispose of this waste. After all, we live under a capitalist system. What does capitalism refer to, but system concerned with capital, I.e. profits. This is why profits always come before people & always will unless we change this economic system. What is fluoride, but a by-product of uranium purification & the phosphate industry? Fluoride is only 2nd to mercury in toxicity. The WPA bans it from rivers & streams, but yet they dump it many reservoirs. Check out: http://www.fluoridealert.org to learn more about water fluoridation & how to put a stop to it. Also check out http://www.workers.org

The American people have voted 3 sex offenders in a row into the White House before this apparent lobotomy patient. How could any organism developed above plankton or bacteria be so bloody stupid? Religion, baby.

http://www.facebook.com/howard.lewis.902 Howard Lewis

We have a serious problem.

LesBarany

I would like to thank the editor of this page for adding the note at the end of the article, which makes it clear that Andre Lassen’s sterling silver skeleton cutlery set is used only to illustrate the story and does not contain radioactive scrap metals. If this attention getting photograph has been of help in getting out the alarming message of this report, Andre is happy to have done his part.

http://www.facebook.com/dfnester Dennis Franklin Nester

There is a viable, cost effective alternative to the federal policy of burying nuclear waste. First, there must be a Congressional Bill passed to allow transmutation, or backwards engineering nuclear waste to a non-radioactive element. In addition to eliminating nuclear waste, the decay heat can turn the steam electric generators at each nuclear power plant to produce electricity.

No Time To Waste: E.I.S. – The Roy Process
for Neutralizing Nuclear Waste – About 18 min.

http://www.facebook.com/karen.lorentzson Karen Lorentzson

I have to be in hell, no kind loving people would do this!

Don

Maybe some nice new filing cabinets and metal desks for the Department of Energy office building are in order.

walt

I suppose this is one way for Obumacare to be called cheaper healthcare, but the way I see it, there is nothing cheap in this plan.

Smannzie

You people are dumb, it’s gonna be an early death for a lot of people. You wanna pay for my funeral costs then you stupid idiots. Why dont you fucking put us in our grave. Ever think maybe if companies would smarten up and produce items with all of there parts recyclable so when we dont want it anymore it can be recycled and made into something else that is useful and have people smarten up and watch what shit they are sending to the landfill. Use your fucking brains for once in your life. You god damn government people are so dumb. THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE SAYING… Radioactivity = Death

Smarten Up

Government = Fail

Smannzie

You people are dumb, it’s gonna be an early death for a lot of people. You wanna pay for my funeral costs then you stupid idiots. Why dont you fucking put us in our grave. Ever think maybe if companies would smarten up and produce items with all of there parts recyclable so when we dont want it anymore it can be recycled and made into something else that is useful and have people smarten up and watch what shit they are sending to the landfill. Use your fucking brains for once in your life. You god damn government people are so dumb. THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE SAYING… Radioactivity = Death

Smarten Up

Government = Fail

Smannzie

You people are dumb, it’s gonna be an early death for a lot of people. You wanna pay for my funeral costs then you stupid idiots. Why dont you fucking put us in our grave. Ever think maybe if companies would smarten up and produce items with all of there parts recyclable so when we dont want it anymore it can be recycled and made into something else that is useful and have people smarten up and watch what shit they are sending to the landfill. Use your fucking brains for once in your life. You god damn government people are so dumb. THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE SAYING… Radioactivity = Death

Smarten Up

Government = Fail

Smannzie

stop using radioactive materials

Smannzie

stop using radioactive materials

Smannzie

think about it if companies would make their design of objects work better to be broken down and recycled into a brand new object we would’nt have so much in the landfill the reason there is so much in the landfill is one people dont think about the environment when they are getting rid of stuff and two the design is not functional. Design Thinkers Johnson and Johnson speaker they made to many lipstick things and they broke it down and made a johnson and johnson sign for their main headquarter instead of sending all the unused lipsticks overstock to the landfill they reused and recycled.

Smannzie

think about it if companies would make their design of objects work better to be broken down and recycled into a brand new object we would’nt have so much in the landfill the reason there is so much in the landfill is one people dont think about the environment when they are getting rid of stuff and two the design is not functional. Design Thinkers Johnson and Johnson speaker they made to many lipstick things and they broke it down and made a johnson and johnson sign for their main headquarter instead of sending all the unused lipsticks overstock to the landfill they reused and recycled.

Guest

from design thinkers watch this youtube video

Guest

from design thinkers watch this youtube video

Smannzie

watch this youtube clip : Kissing Waste Goodbye Johnson and Johnson

Smannzie

watch this youtube clip : Kissing Waste Goodbye Johnson and Johnson

Diane

But, we can ALWAYS trust our government! Go get those flu shots and vaccines. After all, the FDA/Monsanto says they are good for you! Even Bill Gates said vaccines will help “reduce the population.” It’s right on youtube, check it out.

Allan Barr

No different from mixing in majority of coal ash with cement, glow in the dark cement, now thats pretty cool, NOT.